Fried computer

[Iain Hogg]

A friend of mine called me up last week with a PC problem - it wouldn't power up and appeared to be completely dead.

Not having time to look at it myself, I suggested taht it sounded like the PSU had gone tits up.

Anyway, over the weekend he replaced the PSU but got no joy so took the whole lot into a local repair shop.

The diagnosis was that the PSU had gone, the motherboard had gone, the HD had gone and so had the CD drive.

£400 lighter, he came home with a new PC

Then, when trying to re-install his broadband modem, that wouldn't work either. He then borrowed a spare one I had and it is now all working.

Question is, what could have got into his PC to cause such damage? He runs the PC via a surge arrester and the modem is USB powered. Both electricity and phone lines are underground here so not that susceptible to lightning strike.

Anyone got any ideas or suggestions?

Iain

 

[Aidan1150]

Hi Iain,

Any chance of it being a current "spike"? The surge arrester should have stopped it, but it does sound like the innards of the machine have had a good blast of current given the amount of damage sustained.

 

[mikeh501]

If the PSU blew then it could well have given a blast to the motherboard as its the most susceptible component. I've never seen one blow a CD drive though.

Usually you can tell if the PSU goes, because it stinks.

 

[-Robbo-]

If the PSU blew then it could well have given a blast to the motherboard as its the most susceptible component. I've never seen one blow a CD drive though.

Usually you can tell if the PSU goes, because it stinks.

Echo that, I used to be an IBM engineer and worked on desktop machines as well as laptops and servers, and I have never seen a PSU blowing out a CD/DVD drive.

Are you sure the local repair shop weren't out to make a quick buck?

 

[cookie]

AAMOI some surge preventers only work once i believe.

 

[Iain Hogg]

Are you sure the local repair shop weren't out to make a quick buck?

Aren't they all?



I'll make sure my mate keeps all the bits and donates them to me when I have some time. I can then play around to see if any of the bits still work.

If it was a power surge, I find it strange how the modem get fried as it was powered via the USB cable

Iain

 

[turbine_2]

When a PSU blows it can do all sorts of strange things. Sticking a spike up the 12v line could well take out just about anything plugged into the PSU, including the CD drives, floppy drives, fans, motherboard.

 

[shugie]

When a PSU blows it can do all sorts of strange things. Sticking a spike up the 12v line could well take out just about anything plugged into the PSU, including the CD drives, floppy drives, fans, motherboard.

That electric is funny stuff, the thunderstorms the other week fried the carrier detection on an otherwise functional modem, and the ethernet port on a stand alone ADSL firewall - both at the same site. I concluded that the ethernet port was the only point with any path to earth, givena fully isolated power supply.

In the same way, if the PSU failed in such a way as to put a high voltage on the 12V line, then both a CD drive, and a USB device, could get fried.

Being cynical, I too would want to test the failed components, but recognise that they might actually have failed.

 

[Iain Hogg]

Thanks guys for the reassurances I'll be able to pass on.

Meanwhile I've suggested he checks his home contents insurance to see if he can claim anything

Iain